Page 1 of A Royally Fake French Menage
CHAPTER ONE
BARCLAY
“Do you want to come on a date to a castle? Not a real one, just a fake one.”
Those were the words that fell out of my mouth as I stared down at the prettiest little thing Rippton U had to offer.
Genie Lockwood.
My long term crush of four months and three days. The longest I’d ever had in this country. She was cute, sweet, and nothing like my fucked up mess of an ex on campus
And I screwed my chances with her the moment I ballsed up enough to ask her out. At least, I thought I did.
But as always, Genie surprised me.
“The castle, or the date?” She tilted her heart shaped face up and pierced me with those burnt honey eyes that read the lies etched on my soul.
Genie stood in the middle of the campus commons on a perfectly bright, cheery morning, and fuck me did sunshine lance through my soul when she stared at me like that.
“I do beg your pardon?” Twenty-one years of immaculate chevalier training on both my English and French lineage sides kicked in to preserve my pasty ass with an excess of manners.
“Barclay Augustus Chesterfield. Pay attention.” She snapped nude and pale pink tipped nails in my face. Something in her hazel gaze softened the gesture, along with a little booty shake that I could have drooled over for the rest of the afternoon. Or at least until the sun set across campus. “Which one is the fake part? I mean, a crappy cardboard castle sounds terrible but a fake date, I can do.” She smiled brightly, though her hazel eyes remained curious.
Now she thinks I’m a fucking loon.Not that she’d be wrong.
I coughed into my fist, my cheeks heating as a pretty girl watched me with equally pretty eyes. “Uh, no. The castle is real.”Two actually. Depending on the country in question. Shit, is my English passport out of date this year?
The things I couldn't do for myself without paid help about. All the product of a misspent you, if I’d had one at all.
“Awesome.” Genie bounced a little on the balls of her feet and beamed at me. Damn if the sun didn’t glow a little brighter, and angels didn’t fall from the heavens to worship at her delicate toes. “Where are we going?”
“France?” I winced as her eyebrows rose a fraction. “I mean, that’s where the family dinner is, and I need a date. It’s about two hours out of Paris. And… I might have told my mother I had a plus one,” I muttered, breaking eye contact and tried not to wince as I studied my tan loafers.
Fail.
Not my finest moment. I’d admit it, if only to myself.
“Okay.” She smiled up at me when I risked a glance, all cute and stunning and so fucking droolworthy.
I closed my mouth with a wet-sounding snap and managed not to get my excess of saliva on her fluffy fuchsia cardigan. “You're coming?" I couldn't keep the surprise out of my tone.
“I mean, I’ll be your fake date, Barclay.” She shimmied her shoulders, that same cheeky glint in her eye.
Wait. Was my crushflirtingwith me? I gawked at her long enough that I nearly missed her next words. “What?”
“When is it?"
Genie still wore that curiosity-over-conflict expression, but rather than being shy like I expected, she looked more… Excited.
I nodded like a fucking bobble head dog that needed a short leashnow. Maybe she could hold it for me. "You know, I've had a crush on you for the last two years."Way to spill the beans, Barclay.
Maybe I should just move back to France and stay there. Or England, though the staff would probably eat me alive. Coming to the USA had seemed like a fun idea. An escape. A game to play. An easy merge away from an overbearing stepmother once my father’s funeral was over and I had no reason to stay any longer.
And all it did was make me complacent.
I needed more than a fake date and a weekend in a castle that had never been home to recall the mantle of the title I hated.
Barclay Augustus Chesterfield, Marquess of La Borde, France, and Marquess of Bracksley, England.
